The sheer joy on fans’ faces is evident after AR’s INT.
Photo by Ryan Porter

A wall of Cherry and White watches Matt Brown run.
Owlsports.com photo

Plenty of credit to be passed around at Lincoln Financial Field yesterday.
First off, I can’t say enough about the fans.
At least 21,000 showed up. I thought the actual figure was closer to 25K.
They were loud, proud and wore cherry (and some white).
It takes awhile to lose a fan base, like 30 years, so it’s going to take awhile to build one but Lot K was full two hours before the game and there was a long line at the ticket windows when I walked into the stadium a few minutes prior to kickoff.
“YO, ADRIAN” _ Happy Birthday to Adrian Robinson. On his 20th birthday, AR got the play of his life, rushing the quarterback, getting a near sack, then doing one better by tipping the ball and picking off a pass. Then he showed some good old running back skills in moving the field position by about 30 on the plus side.
“NO FAIR CATCHES, DELANO” _ That’s what I always yell from the stands at Delano on every enemy punt. I do that for a reason. He’s a one-man terrific offensive play. He proved me right yesterday. Twice.
HALFTIME ADJUSTMENTS _ Al Golden said that’s the most overrated notion in football. Yet I’ve got to like the fact that Temple was unscored upon in the second half the last two weeks in the second half and finished the last two games 49-0 and 38-0. So I like the halftime adjustments Mark D’Onofrio makes. Notice what happens when you rush the passer.
ESPN HELMET STICKER _ Believe it or not, they gave one to Travis Shelton, even though he’s been gone from the program for awhile. That guy running the ball wearing No. 22 only looked like Travis. Gotta wonder if ESPN.com has copy editors.
GREAT JOB BY THE BAND _ I usually spend the halftimes in the hallways behind the concessions. I had to stay in my seat yesterday because people have been telling me how great the band has been all season. Geez, they were right. Great job and I loved the “Don’t Stop Believing” Theme.
ALL THE MARBLES _ Temple is facing a one-game, winner-take-all, shot for a trip to Detroit and a chance to carry the MAC Trophy around the field on what would be one delicious victory lap. That’s what this game at Ohio, 11 a.m. Friday, is for. A lot of guys never get this opportunity. Let’s hope the Owls make the most out of theirs.

Last week’s Los Angeles Times’ Top 25:

A good way to send the team off would be for a crowd like this.
The sun is setting on the Owls’ home season on Saturday afternoon.
By the time it goes down, if the team plays like (focused) crazed men and takes care of business against Kent State, the Owls could be celebrating a MAC East championship on the field.
A home season which kicked off in the sunset of a late-summer night against Villanova (see photo above) will end pretty close to sunset on a late November Saturday afternoon.
A terrific, fitting (and really only) way to send these exceptional young men off would be for a crowd approaching the opening-game crowd of 27,000 fans.
Don’t ask for stadiums and the like if you can’t get yourself and 29,999 other fans into this one.
In many ways, this is a referendum on Temple football.
If you want a perennial winner, a top 25 program that you can be proud of and the nation will respect, you will vote for it on Saturday.
But you won’t be using your right arm to pull the lever.
You’ll be using your two feet, making your way to the stadium for the 1 p.m. start.
Like we said, though, in an earlier post, hoping for it to happen won’t make it happen.
If you live in California or Colorado or Florida, you are excused.
If you are one of the 150,000 alumni and 33,000 full-time students living in this area, you are not.
We can’t count on disaffected Eagles’ fans to fill our stadium.
We must do it with Temple people proudly wearing Cherry sweatshirts and game jerseys and screaming their heads off when the Owls are on defense.

“This may be the most significant home football game Temple has hosted in 30 seasons. I cannot say this more clearly: GET TO THE GAME! Bring your families, friends, Temple classmates, and all the people who said to you, ‘When Temple starts winning, I’ll be there.’ Now is the time: we’d love to see a 30,000+ crowd to push the Owls to victory.”
_ Bill Bradshaw, AD, Temple

Be proactive the next few days in getting the crowd out:
Some ideas:

• If you have Facebook or MySpace pages, prominently mention the game as The Event of the weekend on it;
• Search for any EVENT page on similar social networking websites and sign up pledging that you will attend;
• Call radio stations talking up the leading freshman runner in the country and the program in general. (Hint: Don’t tell the producer you are calling about Temple football. Tell them you are calling about the Eagles then ease the call into talking about Temple. “I’m so upset with the Eagles, I can’t watch them anymore,” you say. “I have more fun going to the Temple games. At least they win.”
• Sign onto Eagles’ blogs and message boards with a similar take. When someone says “no one gives a bleep about Temple football” you come back wtih “it’s a lot more exciting than watching McNabb choke” or a similar comeback.
• Keep telling them where you will be at 1 p.m. on Saturday afternoon, Lincoln Financial Field.
• Mention how fun the tailgates are in school and at your place of work.
• Tell people “you’ve got to see this Bernard Pierce” and “this is your last chance” and “he’s electric when he touches the ball.”
• Put a sign out on your lawn. “Temple vs. Kent State, 1 p.m., Lincoln Financial Field, for the MAC title.”

All true and just ideas for starters. We’d welcome yours in the comment box below. Forty-eight hours to honor these terrific seniors and this team that has made us so proud.
It might be sunset for the home season, but the sun is just beginning to rise on Temple football with hopefully the best part of the season just ahead.

By Mike Gibson
It’s my week to host the MAC Bloggers’ Roundtable and this week is interesting in that we have a pick ’em game on Saturday, Northern Illinois at Ohio, that could determine whether Temple clinches the MAC East on Saturday or not.
The questions to my fellow bloggers are as follows:
1) Do you like the MAC’s current bowl setup in which the bowls get to pick, rather than a 1 goes to A, 2 to B, etc? Would you change that, if you could?

2) Recognizing that probably no one will probably be fired this year, who do you think will be the NEXT coach in the MAC to get a pink slip?
3) What do you think can be done, if anything, to get the MAC more bowl tie-ins?
4) Who do you like in the MAC’s only pick-’em game of this week, NIU at Ohio, and why?

I will post the answers of my fellow MAC bloggers as I get them below:

By Mike Gibson
The 2008 edition of the Princeton Review ranked Temple as the most diverse undergraduate student population in the nation.
There is much to like about that.
Last night, in a 56-17 win at Akron the Owls proved that there is even more to like about diversity in an offense.
In what was Matt Rhule’s finest hour as an offensive coordinator, the Owls found every conceivable way to diversify their offense.
They scored on a reverse (twice, one was called back on a penalty), they scored on a long bomb, they scored on an intermediate pass, they scored on running plays.
They established their quarterback, Chester Stewart, as a dual threat.
They even scored on special teams, a terrific punt return by the steady (and now spectacular) Delano Green.
For almost all of the seven wins prior to this one, Bernard Pierce has been carrying the Owls on his broad shoulders.
While it had been fun to watch, you kind of knew that his back would break somewhere along the way if things didn’t change.
That would have been an OK plan if the Owls had no other weapons but you and I and Al Golden and Rhule all know that Edberg-Olson Hall if filled with extremely talented players who can do great things with the ball.

Pierce is a good one, the best, but he’s not the only one.
I’ve been saying all year that Temple’s No. 1 priority on offense should be feature the talents of Pierce, sure, but to also play off the fear of him by throwing the ball to their edge weapons downfield.
They did that on a long touchdown pass from Stewart to Michael Campbell. They did it on long reverse by Jason Harper and 4.3-40 sprinter James Nixon.
Now the Owls have planted a needed seed in the minds of their future foes: Load up and try to take away Pierce at your own peril.
It was a great night for Temple and proof that this team is getting better as crunch time approaches. The defense was great (49-0 over the last three quarters), but it’s been that way all season.
The No. 1 concern was a lack of diversity on offense and it appears that the Owls have now found a pretty good formula going forward.
Last night, they showed that diversity can be a beautiful thing.

Owls must find a way to get weapons like Evan Rodriguez, Joe Jones, Jason Harper and James Nixon active and involved.
Special credit for Evan Rodriguez photo to Tom Schoenewald

McManus kicks game-winner
Temple at Akron
Kickoff: 8:30 p.m.
TV: ESPNU
Radio: WPHT, 1210AM

By Mike Gibson
A very wise man (an old Owl, actually) once told me that a good offensive coordinator is like a magician.
“He’ll be able to show you three shells and tell you where the ball is at and then lift it up, only to reveal the ball under another shell,” the Owl, err, man, said.
Over the last few weeks or so, Temple’s offense has been like that shell game.
Only over that time, the Owls showed their shells and the crowd watching guessed where the ball was pretty much all the time.
Not much magic there.
The No. 30 shell, otherwise known as Bernard Pierce, had the ball.
We knew it.
They knew it.
They could do nothing about it.
Miami (Ohio), though, was really the first team to figure out how to combat this offense.
Trailing, 31-13, the No. 1 way the RedHawks were able to get back into the game was sending 11 men to the No. 30 shell. That led to a lot of three-and-outs and a lot of opportunities for the RedHawks to get back into the game. They did, and even led, 32-21, with two minutes to go.
Temple won by countering with a pass on first down. They they ran it. Then they kicked a field goal.
Game over.
Seventh-straight win, 34-32.
The Owls travel to Akron (Friday night, 8:30 p.m., ESPNU) and the Zips will be able to read Miami’s blueprint to beat Temple by then.
Sell out for the run and dare Temple to pass.
That’s why it might bode Temple head coach Al Golden and Matt Rhule to come with a new Golden/Rhule, ala a Chinese Proverb:

If enemy figures your plan out, go with another plan.

In this case, though, the plan is not all that hard to devise.
Temple has a new quarterback, Chester Stewart, who was a winner while playing at DeMatha in Hyattsville, Md. In his senior year there, Stewart threw for 17 touchdowns and showed the kind of rollout ability to hit moving targets on the run that caused defensive coordinators headaches. He was a major reason why DeMatha went 10-0 and won the D.C. City Title his senior year.
If the Owls want to continue this impressive winning streak, they are going to have to incorporate Stewart, with Pierce, as a major part of this new plan.
Stewart can hit talented tight end Evan Rodriguez, who opened some eyes up in spring ball with his ability to catch and break tackles, in the soft spot of the zones 15, 20 and 30 yards downfield.
He can rear back after play-action fakes to Pierce and hit 4.3-40 sprinter James Nixon on a fly pattern deep down the center of the field.
He can throw 15-yard sideline slants to Joey Jones and Michael Campbell and Jason Harper and have those guys used their exceptional speed and talent to juke defenders and make extra RAC (run-after-catch) yards.
He can and he must, but it must be part of a show formulated by Rhule and approved by Golden.
You and I know what kind of talent those guys bring to this show, but the rest of the league doesn’t. Their talent has been kept under wraps.
So far.
That’s the beauty of this plan.
It might not mean 40 carries for Pierce (like two of the last three games), but it will be 25 or so more effective carries for The Franchise and a number of needed touches for the incredible edge weapons this team has.
The most impressive trick in this magic show is making a blueprint to beat Temple disappear.

Sorry the Miami recap is so late.
Something called a real job and sleep (too little of it) got in the way.
Back to game day.
If the three hours of Temple football aren’t the fastest in all of sports, then the three hours of pre-game tailgating rate a close second.
In between, I almost tripped over a wire in a tent where a couple of great young alumni fans had a portable heater (it was really appreciated, by the way) but I showed the kind of balance that made me the Bernard Pierce (well, more like Shelley Poole) of my 125-pound Far Northeast traveling team back in the day.
(If I only had their speed …)
And a good time was had by all ….
I saw a lot to like, less to dislike and, for the first time this season, I saw a head coach who showed me some cajones by making a move that had to be made.
All that said, I just want to say this:
How about ‘dem OWLboys!
How about ‘dat OWL Golden?
Some thumbs ups, some thumbs downs:
MARK D’ONOFRIO _ The last three years, I’ve become convinced that Mark D’Onofrio is the one of the best defensive coordinators in all of college football. If he isn’t the best, he’s the best no one knows about. No bigger MDO fan than me, but I think this bend-but-don’t-break approach is absolute garbage. It killed us against Villanova. It almost got us killed against Fake Miami. I’ve been saying this all year and it bears repeating. Get to the g-damn quarterback. If you can’t get there with four, send five. If you can’t get there with five, send six. If you can’t get there with six, send seven. If you can’t get there with seven, send eight. Chances are almost 100 percent that you will get to the QB if you send eight. In the 2 percent event that you don’t, I have confidence that Marquise Liverpool, Jacquain Jarrett and Dominique Harris are talented enough, athletic enough and fast enough to keep the damage in front of them.
AL GOLDEN _ Just an incredible ballsy move to pull the quarterback. You might ask what’s so incredible about pulling the starting QB after a 5 for 17, 37 yards, 2 picks, 0 TDs? I say it is incredible. How many QBs have been pulled after winning six straight games? It says that a 5 for 17 and 2 picks is an unacceptable performance level and it sends a message to the rest of the team that everybody’s performance is under review and that you must play to a high standard to keep your job.

LFF SECURITY _ Specifically, CSC Security, which holds a contract from LFF. A can of beer, smuggled in some some kids, “rolled” (or was placed, I prefer to think rolled) under the seat of an older lady sitting on the Temple side. She comes to the games every year. She never does nothing but cheer, but CSC security guards approached her, saw the can of beer under her seat, and asked her to leave. She refused to leave so they forcibly removed her to the protests of all around her. CSC guards would take no input from the crowd, they just acted as judge, jury and executioner. Big men, CSC. Kicking out an old lady. Temple should hunt that lady down and give her two free season tickets for next season.
MATT RHULE _ Nobody wants to give the ball to The Franchise more than I do, but 40 times a game? C’mon, Matt. What if he gets hurt? What’s Plan B? Let’s play off some effective BP runs by rolling out Chester and hitting talented guys like James Nixon, Evan Rodriguez, Steve Manieri, Joey Jones, Michael Campbell in that soft spot of both sidelines 15-20 yards down the field. Guess what? You make those throws and you might open up more stuff underneath for The Franchise. I bet you’ll see him go 70 that much more when defenses don’t know which shell the ball is under.
VAUGHN CHARLTON _ Yeah, you read that right, Vaughn Charlton. He’s the captain of the team and the ultimate team player. What a superb job he did selling the fake FG and scoring the touchdown. Temple doesn’t win that game without that play from Charlton. I love the fact that this kid took Chris Coyer under his wing in the early stages of summer ball and said, “He’s just a tremendous quarterback. I’m looking forward to getting to know him.” The two are roommates and, I assume, friends. If that’s not leadership, I don’t know what is.
THE FANS _ Although the crowd was 13,897, the fans were into it. The SEPTA strike killed the crowd from a couple of different levels. Our students rely on that mode to get to the games. Heck, a lot of our alumni do, too. Plus, the city was gridlocked for hours before the game. No one wanted to fight that traffic. (I did, and was stuck on I-95 for an hour.) Still, I got to the game with three hours to spare and made the pre-game tailgate. Once inside the stadium, thank God a talented young photographer, Ryan Porter (you’ve seen his work on this site), took the night off and ended up seated next to me. When I started a “Let’s Go TEM-PLE” cheer he joined in and that got our entire section going. When I yelled (more than once but less than 40 times) “GIVE THE BALL TO THE FRANCHISE!” a couple of guys, complete strangers, joined in and yelled that with me. Then they came down to our row and joined me and Ryan with some full-throtted cheering the rest of the game. Other fans in different sections picked up their game, too. That’s my dream. To not only get 40,000 into Temple games on a regular basis but to get them active and involved.
That’s the Promised Land I see on the other side of the mountain for Temple football.
I hope I get there with you.

Owl Nation …. Photo courtesy of Owlsports.com

MAC sack leader Adrian Robinson
Temple-Miami
Thursday, Nov. 5
Kickoff: 7:30 p.m.
Line: Temple by 17 1/2
Records: Owls 6-2, Miami 1-8
Radio: WHAT-AM, 1340
TV: None

Now that the Phillies have lost to the Yankees, there is no excuse for Owl Nation.

Show up and represent for one of the hottest college football teams in the country, YOUR Temple Owls.

Could there have been anything worse for Temple football than for the Owls to be playing a live game against the seventh game of the World Series in a town crazed for one of the participants on a cold night when the buses and subways aren’t running?

That would have been a Doomsday Scenario for Temple attendance on the same level of a loss to Villanova.

Well, if you don’t have a car, it might be tough to get to the Linc but the university is offering free bus rides to all interested students.

So there is no excuse whatsoever for the 10,000 students who live on campus.

It’s time for the 260,000 living Temple alumni to get with the (football) program as well, since most of us have cars and can take up to five other people with us.

The football team has done their part and they are working hard to do more for our great university. They have goals far beyond what they have already accomplished.

You can help them by showing up Thursday night and showing that you care.

There are few teams playing Football Bowl Subdivision ball who need fans, a following, a crowd more than Temple does but too often crap out of the Owls’ control conspires against them.

Now that the Owls are winning and the Phillies have lost, both Temple’s on-and-off-field luck is changing for good.

Gosh, I certainly hope so.

Consider past happenings that have helped ruin the attendance:
The Catch That Was (but ruled wasn’t) _ Bruce Francis caught a ball two years ago at UConn that would have boosted 2007 attendance immeasurably. Yet a Big East (yes, Big East) replay official ruled a catch wasn’t a catch.
The Philadelphia Hurricane _ Hurricanes never hit Philadelphia, right? Wrong. The UConn rematch of 2008 was much ballyhooed and promoted with billboards. A crowd of close to 30,000 was expected but a legitimate Catergory One Hurricane (Hanna) rolled through Philadelphia just in time for a Saturday noon kickoff. On the nightly news 12 hours earlier, John Bolaris reported, “No, Temple won’t be playing tomorrow. No way in this weather.” Bolaris signed off before anyone could correct that boozo that football games are played in all kinds of weather. People turned off the TV and stayed away, many thinking there would not even be a game. The fact that 17,000 die-hards attended and cheered their butts off was remarkable.
The Hail Mary _ It’s thrown hundreds of times and knocked down hundreds of times. One or two times every 40 or so years, somebody gets lucky. Buffalo got lucky. Temple attendance suffered the rest of the year.
The Navy fumble _ Everybody else takes a knee in the situation the Owls found themselves in last year in Annapolis. Temple decided to run a play instead, ala Miracle of the Meadowlands. So what happened? Miracle in Annapolis.
The Villanova Debacle _ I saw literally hundreds of people, guys I haven’t seen in years, in the pre-game parking lot of this year’s Sept. 3 game who told me how excited they were to be playing Villanova again. Almost to a man, all of them offered a caveat. “If we don’t beat the crap out of this team, I won’t be back,” they said. “I mean it.” I haven’t seen a single one of them back since. That was an attendance-killer for the rest of the season, no matter what the Owls did after it. I was stunned at the depth of feeling going into the stadium and even more convinced that folks were serious about what they said when I walked out of the stadium that night. People felt that strongly about beating Villanova.
The Army Nor’easter _ Owls expected a huge crowd, about 25,000, for Homecoming against Army in October. Unfortunately, a Nor’easter picked Temple’s Homecoming to ruin that day. Crowd would have been about 25K with nice weather. It turned out to be 14K and a lot of alumni just skipped Homecoming rather than deal with the wind, rain and cold.
Temple finally deserves to reap the rewards of being the biggest, most interesting, sports story in town.
Sorry to see the Phillies lose but the alternative would have been ugly for the Owls.
Now our fans can make it a beautiful night by doing nothing more strenuous than getting off their butts to get to the game and standing and cheering for three hours at the game.
It’s not much to ask.

The question was posed to a young Bernard Pierce in the locker room at Lincoln Financial Field a couple of weeks ago.

“Dude, do you realize you have a chance to break Paul Palmer’s records?”
“Who’s Paul Palmer?” Pierce said.
What some longtime Temple fans might see as blasphemy was really an innocent remark that illustrated, more than anything else, how young Bernard Pierce is.
The true freshman wasn’t even born yet when the kid known as Boo-Boo was in a heated battle with Vinny Testaverde for the 1986 Heisman Trophy.

On Halloween, Bernard Pierce came dressed up as Paul Palmer.
Chances are, Pierce will get to know Boo-Boo well in the coming months and years as each record Palmer set falls.
Temple beats Villanova by AT LEAST 20 points with this sure-handed young superstar getting 20 or more carries, rather than the six he had in the opener.
You’d have to be Stevie Wonder not to see that.
Today, Pierce rushed for 267 yards and two spectacular touchdowns as the Owls overcame an anemic passing attack to beat Navy, 27-24, otherwise known as the best team on their schedule not named Penn State. He did a good impersonation of Paul Palmer on Halloween, becoming the first Owl runner since Boo-Boo to rush for over 200 yards in consecutive games.

Numbers don’t lie
Bernard Pierce:
29 carries
267 yards
2 touchdowns
Vaughn Charlton:
5 for 17
37 yards
0 touchdowns
2 interceptions

The fact that the Owls could not throw the ball and hit open receivers (check the film, they were running open through the Navy secondary all day) only makes what Pierce did all that more impressive.
As the game went on, Navy’s defense loaded up in the box to stop Pierce.
Didn’t matter.
He was too quick, too strong, too fast.
The Owls’ offensive line, which averages 310 pounds across the front, also deserves a lot of credit. They knocked Navy off the ball like bowling pins. There is a photo accompanying this story that shows Pierce running through a hole and the Temple line knocking Navy off the ball in the background.
There is still much work to be done for this Owls’ team to reach its potential.
The passing game, which really has alternated between bad and worse (today was worse), needs to be fixed.
I’ve been saying that for eight weeks, but no one wants to fix it.
It’s tempting to say leave well enough alone, but I won’t join that crowd.
Why not make something real good better, if you can? Why not play off Pierce’s runs by throwing touchdown passes to James Nixon, Michael Campbell, Steve Manieri and Evan Rodriguez?
Those guys are doing their jobs by getting open, just like Pierce does his job by punishing linebackers and running past safeties.
You’ve got to be able to get someone in there who can throw the ball effectively.
Some hard decisions about personnel are going to have to be made at that position.
To win the championship, the Owls need to make Pierce more of a weapon by fixing the firing mechanism.
Who’s Paul Palmer, yes, but another question could be:
Where’s Matty Baker?